on april 19, 1564, ivan fedorov and pyotr mstislavets began printing the apostle. first russian dated that, books in russia were only handwritten, but the printing press had already been invented; in 1553, ivan the terrible ordered the construction of a printing yard not far from the kremlin on nikolskaya street. one of the tributes from that first printing house has survived. the case was entrusted to deacon ivan fedorov; he knew latin and greek and knew how to bind books. the first to decide was to print the acts and epistles of the apostles; this is part of the new testament. written by the evangelist luke. fedorov, his main assistant, pyotr mstislavets and journeymen, they cast type for each letter, cut out wooden ornaments to decorate the book , and carefully selected the primary source, since different manuscripts of the apostle were sent from the monasteries. the preparation took 10 years, the printing itself on french paper took another year, the result was a book of 534 pages, 25 lines each. the circulation was large for those. on april 19, 1783, catherine ii announced the en